BBC Gaza Documentary Ruled a 'Significant' Violation of Media Standards, Declares UK Media Regulator
The BBC engaged in a "serious breach" of media regulations by failing to disclose that the presenter of a programme about Gaza was the child of a Hamas official, as ruled by UK media regulator Ofcom.
An investigation by the broadcasting watchdog into the documentary titled Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone has found that the film was "materially misleading".
The head of the BBC had earlier expressed regret, saying there had been "a major oversight in relation to accuracy".
The regulator has directed the broadcaster to transmit a prime-time declaration about its conclusions.
"Since this amounts to a serious breach of our regulations, we are directing the corporation to transmit a announcement of our conclusions against it on BBC2 at nine o'clock in the evening, with a schedule to be finalised," the regulator stated.
'Risk to Undermine Trust'
The regulator's announcement declared: "Our investigation determined that the documentary's failure to disclose that the presenter's male guardian occupied a role in the Hamas-controlled administration was materially misleading.
"This implied that the public did not have essential details which may have been extremely pertinent to their judgment of the narrator and the details he provided.
"Trust is at the center of the relationship between a media organization and its viewers, particularly for a national broadcasting corporation such as the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"This oversight had the potential to erode the exceptionally strong amounts of trust that the public would have invested in a documentary produced by the BBC about the conflict in Gaza."
The film was removed from the BBC's streaming service in last February after the narrator's personal associations emerged, and in the month of July an broadcaster's internal assessment concluded it violated the broadcaster's journalistic standards on factual correctness.
A representative for the broadcaster commented: "The Ofcom ruling is in line with the findings of Peter Johnston's review, that there was a major oversight in the film in relation to the BBC's Editorial Guidelines on accuracy, which reflects Rule 2.2 of the authority's broadcasting regulations.
"We expressed regret for this and we comply with the regulator's ruling in complete. We will follow the sanction as soon as the timing and language are finalised."
